When software utilizing a client-server architecture is being distributed to customers, the server portion of the software is installed on a server computer system, and the client portion of the software is typically installed on each client computer system attached to the network. The installation of the server portion of the software is routine, since usually there is only one, or a very few, server computer systems. Installation of the client portion of the software is considerably more difficult.
Often there are many client computer systems, sometimes hundreds, and the client portion of the software must be installed individually on each machine. One prior art method of accomplishing this installation is for an installer to manually take the software distribution media to each client machine and individually install from the media onto that machine. A more efficient method is to first install the client portion of the software on the server machine, and then an installer goes to each individual client machine, logs on to the machine, and manually enters the commands necessary to copy and install the software, from the network server, onto the client machine.
Another prior art method is to manually place a download program on the server and client machines, then the download program can be used to automatically install other client-server software over a network connecting the server and client machines. This method has the disadvantage that the download program must first be manually installed on all the client machines, which requires considerable effort when a large number of client machines are being served.
All these methods, however, require considerable time to perform the installation, either of the client server software or the download program, particularly where a large number of client computer systems are involved.
In addition to installation, these same problems exist for reconfiguring the client computer systems, and also for uninstalling the client computer systems, as well as many other operations that may have to be done on the client computer systems.
There is need in the art then for a way of installing the client portion of client server software onto client machines without requiring that the software or a download program be manually copied to each client computer system. The present invention meets this and other needs in the art.